Everything Soup

Making a big pot of soup before I leave for the week seems to work well. M doesn't mind if he eats the same thing day after day, and I can freeze a portion or two of each week's soup to give me variety on the weeks I am home. This week is leftovers soup, mixed with a 7 bean and barely soup mix from Henry's. I'm sure we could make our own mix of lentils, beans, barley, etc, but this was inexpensive and curious... so we tried it.

3 cups mixed beans and barley, soaked overnight
1 onion, previously rolling around the crisper drawer
3 slightly wobbly celery stalks
2 somewhat bendy carrots
3 ears white corn
2 cloves garlic
2 lightly crumpled bay leaves from the back of the spice shelf
2c homemade chicken broth
2c store-bought "must finish this carton" chicken broth
water
2 generous handfuls white button mushrooms
2tbsp olive oil
~1c leftover roasted chicken

Put the oil in a large stockpot and warm. Dice the onion in small pieces and add. Stir occasionally while preparing the other veggies. Dice and add to the pan celery and carrots. Mince and add garlic. When the onion has gone translucent, dump in the well-soaked beans and barley mix, add the broth, add some water to fill the pot to a reasonable depth. While that's coming to a boil, cut the corn off the cob and into the pot. Chop up the leftover chicken and add to the pot. Add the bay leaves. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to keep soup a slow boil or simmer, cover.

Simmer for 2-2.5 hours or until the biggest beans are cooked through. In our mix, the pintos took the longest. Dice and add the mushrooms and cook 10-15 min further. Fish out the bay leaves. Leave covered to keep warm until serving.

We now have a huge stockpot full of bean soup, and we used up the aging veggies from the fridge. Mom would be proud. ~_^